Some people use 3-4 lures all their life here in Croatia. They keep it simple. When they go for a zander, they throw white, or yellow grub. For pike, there is inline spinnerbait with willow leaf blade.
Now and then, they put a Rapala Original on a snap and that´s it. And they catch fish. On the other side, there is us. Me and my friends, as well as some unknown fellows, kind of people that would tie the devil himself on a line if we only could. Just to see how he wiggles on retrieve and darts on a twitch.
Although I have more than enough lures of all kinds, I am allways in a search for a something new. And in those rare moments when I think I have it all, or at least enough, somehow it happens that something new finds me.
That special evening, I wasn´t looking for anything. Cross my heart and hope to die! I even have 2 witneses that I was sitting calm in a Cajti caffe, drinking Velebitsko beer and watching football on a TV. I wasn`t thinking about fish, fishing, lures, rods, or anything similar. I just sat there and that was it.
Then my good friend Krmpa came. Without rhyme or reason he pulled some 10 to 15 bags of soft plastic lures of various kinds. Bye-bye football, hello rubbers! As he was sipping his gorki pelinkovac (croatian liqueur made of aromatic herbs, goes nice with beer), I was digging into the bags.
From that pile of rubber I picked 3 pieces at the end. The one that Krmpa was claiming has the best action ever I didn´t take. I simply couldn´t because it smelled bad. Real bad. And it wasn´t beauty queen either. The three I took looked like a tuned Lunker City Shakers. They sat in my box, I ignored them for a month, or two and then they saved the day 2 times in 48 hours, when i couldn´t get a bite on anything else.
[ezcol_1half][/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end][/ezcol_1half_end]
Next telephone conversation went something like this:
´Hey, buddy, those rubbers i took from you, what´s that? Keitech Easy Shiner? OK, thanks..´Keitech was established in 1996. by Kei Hayashi. All I managed to find on web is that one of the mostsuccessful tournament fisherman in Japan.
Anyhow, Mr Hayashi´s Easy Shiner is another exciting swimbait with a great catch ratio. It comes in 3 sizes: 3, 4 and 5 inch and variety of colours. Sleek profile is created by a fusion of a Shad Impact´s body and a Swing Impact paddle tail.
Because of it´s tall and slender body, Easy Shiner has great body roll. Body roll which is not as aggressive as one would think by looking only. That´s why it can be rigged on hooks with heads weighting only 2-3 g (1/16-1/8 oz) and still have great, not too offensive action, which isn´t case with other swimbaits with similar shape of body. I found an information on the web that upper side of a body is made of one material, and lower of another, salt infused material. This could be a reason of it´s great, not too strong body roll considering that salted material is heavier than the one without salt. Material is pretty soft and that also contributes to Easy Shiner´s great action. It is scented with squid scent, but not as heavily as Swing Impact. According to our experiences, it works for pike and zander, and we have no doubt that trout and largemouth bass will find it attractive as well when season comes.
Unlike some other swimbaits who have hollow belly, Easy Shiner has only a shallow slot on it´s belly. In that way, normal jig hook gives good support to the body, so it won´t slide off the hook during a cast or retrieve. On the other hand, worm hook sits nicely and hooks up fish well. He is more durable than hollow belly swimbaits as well.
We achieved best results by rigging it on a jig hook, or a weighted offset worm hook and twitching it gently. Rigged like that it gives the most. Wide and tall body produces a lot of flash, but overall action isn` tacky at all. By our experiences, that works great for active and semi-active fish, especialy for zander, which often needs to be tampered, but not too much.